


Hyperthermia vs Hypothermia

by StrongerWithThePack



Category: Thunderbirds
Genre: Family, Hurt/Comfort, Whump
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-14
Updated: 2020-06-14
Packaged: 2021-03-07 17:22:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,089
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26681350
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/StrongerWithThePack/pseuds/StrongerWithThePack
Summary: "Do you two coordinate your disasters just to irate me?" Virgil asked in exasperation.
Comments: 4
Kudos: 12





	Hyperthermia vs Hypothermia

**Author's Note:**

> This is my second fic for the Sensory Sunday challenge organised by gumnut-logic on Tumblr. This weeks sense is 'touch'. Hope you like it!

**Sensory Sunday: Touch**

"Do you two coordinate your disasters just to irate me?" Virgil asked in exasperation as he warmed up another heating pad between his hands.

Scott just shrugged but Gordon grinned at him. "Just keeping you on your t-toes bro."

The joke was kind of lost in the sound of chattering teeth so Virgil just rolled his eyes and placed the final heating pad onto Gordon's chest. His little brother hissed slightly at the startling change in temperature. Virgil eyed him wearily, he was still pale and his lips had a slight blue tinge to them but at least he was shivering again which meant he was warming up.

He crossed the infirmary to examine how his other patient was doing. Scott, in complete contrast, had a cooling blanket draped over him with ice packs around his neck and armpits. Virgil removed the cold compress from his brother's forehead and held his hand over it, cringing at the heat still coming off him.

Somehow Scott had come back from his rescue with severe heatstroke and then he'd had to go and pick up Gordon because he'd managed to get hypothermia. It was almost laughable. In fact he had laughed, and now he was regretting all his life choices as he yoyoed between heating and cooling treatments.

"You're dehydrated, you need to keep drinking Scott." He reiterated, eyeing the still full glass of water he'd left by his brother's bed. "Don't make me put an IV in."

"Don't even think about it." Scott grumbled, grabbing the glass, a little too aggressively, and drinking a few sips.

Scott's skin was sunburnt and irritated and Virgil could see it starting to peel at his hairline and cheeks. He'd already put cream on them so there wasn't much more he could do.

"Don't blame me, you were the one who decided not to wear your UV shielded helmet." Virgil shot back with a hint of annoyance in his tone because this could all have been avoided if his older brother wasn't such an idiot.

Scott just glared at him and Virgil rolled his eyes. He knew his brother was regretting that decision now that he was confined to the infirmary and off duty for 48 hours. He'd argued about the amount of time but Virgil was not budging on that one. He knew the dangers of heatstroke and he wasn't risking his brother going out before he was ready.

"Hey V-Virgil, seeing as I kept my helmet on, do I w-win this one?" Gordon called.

"Seeing as you were at the bottom of the ocean, I'm glad you made that decision." Virgil replied with a smile shaking his head.

Scott piqued up then, apparently putting the dots together. "How did you end up with Hypothermia anyway Gordon? Your suit should have protected you from those temperatures."

Trust Scott to jump on the big brother train first opportunity he got. Gordon just grinned sheepishly.

"Well I said I kept my helmet on, I never said anything about the rest of my suit."

"What!? Gordon, report."

Virgil sighed. "Scott you're supposed to be resting. You're _both_ supposed to be resting."

Scott narrowed his eyes at Gordon.

"Fine." He said getting comfy on the bed. "Let's call it a bedtime story then, on you go Gordon."

Virgil frowned but didn't stop Gordon as he dove into the story with all his usual dramatics. He was pretty curious as well, he'd only heard a condensed version from John earlier.

_"I've just got one more to get John" Gordon told his space monitor brother as he prepared to swim across from Thunderbird 4 to the downed submersible once again._

_John popped up looking slightly distracted. "Okay Gordon. Listen, Scott's got himself in a bit of trouble, think you'll be okay to navigate solo?"_

_"FAB John."_

_Gordon felt some concern rising for his oldest brother, but John would've told him if it was serious. He turned his focus back to the rescue. 3 crewmen aboard a research submersible in the Arctic Ocean that had been hit by a Bowhead whale._

_Gordon was familiar with the mammal, Bowhead whales have a massive triangular skull to help them break through the ice in these waters so its unsurprising that it was able to do so much damage to the tiny sub. The entire vehicle was flooded, luckily the crew all had dry suits and breathing apparatus. The problem was getting them from their vehicle to Thunderbird 4 through the strong currents in the water. Due to the unpredictable waters he wasn't able to dock safely to the vehicle._

_So, now he was free swimming across with the researchers but he had to take them one at a time in case the currents were too strong for them to make the swim. It was a fairly standard rescue. He should be done soon. John had directed him to the divers in the first place but he knew where to go now._

_Gordon swam through the outer hatch once more, battling his way across to the submersible. These definitely weren't recreational waters, the current was strong. He really had to pump through the water hard to get through. It was a cross current so he was swimming pretty much diagonally to where he wanted to go, pushing against the current while also propelling himself forward. It was slow work but his hand finally found a rung on the research vessel._

_Pulling himself through the opening he'd made previously he swam through the flooded hallways to where he left the last researcher._

_"Final call for dry land." He called out as he turned the corner. Luckily the woman was right where he'd left her and she smiled gratefully._

_"What would we do without you International Rescue." She said in a relieved tone, her Icelandic accent coming though strongly._

_"All in a day's work ma'am" Gordon replied with a smile as he attached a line between them. It was always nice meeting kind people on the job. It was pretty rare when everyone you met was going through what was likely one of the worst experiences of their life so he usually shrugged off any unsavoury characters._

_They were almost at the door when the compulsory disaster every rescue seemed to contain occurred. The whole station started to flip on its side and they were thrown into the wall. Gordon felt a searing pain in his side as a piece of bent metal cut into his suit. It was a shallow cut but that wasn't what Gordon needed to worry about. He hissed as a flood of sub-zero temperature water flooded into his suit. It felt like daggers against his bare skin._

_Okay. That puts a time limit on things._

_He sucked in a sharp breath, trying to stop his heart racing from the shock of the cold water and turned to the researcher._

_"Are you alright?" he gasped out._

_"I'm fine." She seemed a little dazed before noticing the tear in his suit and widening her eyes. "Your suit?"_

_"I'll be fine." He shrugged off. "Let just get you out of here."_

_She looked at him with uncertainty but complied, nonetheless. Oxygen wasn't an issue, he doubted it would leak into his helmet to that extent before they got back to Thunderbird 4. He wasn't stupid though, he knew the risks in these temperatures but the best thing to do would be to just finish the rescue as quickly as possible._

_He started swimming with the researcher swimming behind him. None of the research team would have made it through the currents alone, the connecting cable pulled taunt every time and he ended up propelling himself and his passenger through the water. It was what he expected though, the required level of swimming ability you needed to obtain an underwater vehicle license was pretty low._

_The swim was definitely harder this time though, the cold seeping into his suit seemed to be burning his skin and his limbs were feeling sluggish. It didn't help that the rip was near his chest, it would be reducing his core body temperature a lot faster. He was surprised John wasn't already screaming at him._

_His muscles were burning by the time he was able to latch on to his bird and he took a second to catch his breath before opening the outer hatch. He let the researcher in before him and gave a sigh as the water drained out of the compartment. Usually he'd be completely dry under the suit at this point but the soaked fabric clung to him and he shivered violently._

_He secured the last researcher with her colleagues, leaving them with a reassuring smile, that probably wasn't vey reassuring considering how bad his teeth were chittering, before heading to the cockpit and letting out a sigh. He was freezing._

_"Thunderbird 4, your suit readings are showing a sharp decline in body temperature. What's your status?"_

_John had popped up on the comm, his brow furrowed. Gordon was feeling pretty rubbish but he didn't want to distract his brother if Scott still needed help._

_"I'm okay Thunderbird 5, go help Scott." He assured._

_"Scott's fine Gordon, he's back on Tracy Island now. What's your status?"_

_Gordon sighed in relief, realising he'd been holding on to some stress about his brothers situation subconsciously._

_"My suit was compromised while in the water John." He reported. "I may be in the beginning stages of hypothermia." He replied sheepishly._

_What he didn't expect was an amused smirk from John and the questioning tone. "Hypothermia?"_

_Gordon was confused now, he was in the Arctic Ocean with a ripped dry suit, of course he was hypothermic. He must have let some of that confusion show on his face because John just shook his head and muttered. "It doesn't matter, just know Virgil is not going to be happy."_

_"Can you make it to the drop-off point?" John asked him, changing the subject._

_Gordon was still confused at his brothers questioning but replied. "Yeah, I'm only 20 minutes off the port, but I may need a pick-up from there."_

_"FAB Gordon, I'll notify Virgil. Let me know if it gets any worse."_

_"Thanks John."_

"And then Virgil came to rescue me and brought the warmth with him." Gordon ended, snuggling down into his pile of blankets and heat pads.

"John called me exactly 30 seconds after I had got Scott settled and treated for _heatstroke_ telling me that you had _hypothermia_ and needed a picked up." Virgil interjected shaking his head in mock disappointment.

"You know you love us." Gordon grinned and Virgil was glad the colour seemed to be coming back to his cheeks. He repositioned the heat packs that had fallen out of place during his brother's theatrical hand gestures.

Scott groaned. "Urghh, just looking at those heat pads is making want to throw up again."

"Again? I think it's story time for you now big brother." Gordon piqued up.

Now it was Scott's turn to look sheepish. "Wellll I was in Mongolia helping with earthquake evacuations and bear in mind here that this rescue took over 10 hours"

_"Okay John, I'm moving on to Sector G now."_

_"What? Scott you just finished searching Sector G."_

_"Oh. Sector…" Scott had to do a quick run through of the alphabet to figure out what came next. "…H then. Sector H."_

_John noticed the pause._

_"There is no Sector H Scott. You're done."_

_"Uh…Great. I'll head back to One then" Scott said looking around about him. He was glad to be done, he'd had a pretty bad headache for a couple of hours now but it had started to subside._

_John frowned at him but replied anyway. "FAB Scott."_

_Scott slowly made his way back to his bird. He was desperately looking forward to a nice long, cool shower when he got home. It had been a long day and he technically hadn't needed to stay past the last aftershock but the local aid services just didn't have the equipment they did. It was a much faster evacuation with him helping. He had been out in the sun all day though and he could feel the heat on his face._

_Gordon was so going to laugh at him for getting burnt and he could already hear Virgil's lecture on wearing sun cream._

_"Scott, where are you going?" John questioned as he popped up on his watch._

_Scott looked around himself. He had no idea where he was going. Huh._

_"Uh, I might be a little lost Thunderbird 5."_

_John frowned at him again. One of those frowns that said_ you're acting weird.

_"I'll send through coordinates."_

_"Thanks John."_

_His brother signed off again. Scott knew Gordon was on another rescue so he didn't bother his space-bound brother again, even though it took him way longer to calculate a path from the coordinates than it should have._

_Finally setting eyes on his bird was a relief. The insulated metal encasing that promised a cool environment inside. Except when he did step inside, and the cool air hit him, all that greeted him was a strong feeling of nausea. He barely had time to grab a bin bag before he was emptying the contents of his stomach into it. He sank down onto his knees and heaved over the bag as the feeling failed to pass._

_"-ott what's wrong?" He finally registered._

_Bringing his arm up he was met with a worried looking John which managed to shake him out of the nauseous daze he'd ended up in._

_"John. M'fine." He mumbled. It didn't even sound convincing to himself._

_He pushed himself off the floor but was met with worrying double vision before it tunnelled and he ended up on his knees again, slumping sideways into the wall of his bird, trying to blink the spots out of his eyes._

_"You're not fine, Scott. Stay down." John ordered. "When did this start?"_

_Scott sighed, moving to sit with his back against the wall, resigned to his fate as John quizzed him. He was usually pretty good at pretending to be fine but not being able to stand up was a bit of a giveaway._

_"I don't know John. When I got to my bird, I just felt really ill."_

_John's lips pursed but his attention got pulled to something on his left._

_"Hang on Scott, it's Gordon." He made to blink away but turned back warning. "Don't move."_

_Scott started to stand up as soon as his brother was gone. In his defence, he did take it very slow this time. He leaned heavily against the wall as he stood, breathing deeply to try and dispel the nausea. His skin was tight and irritated, he rested his cheek against the cool metal of his bird and sighed at the relief it provided. His skin was on fire. That probably gave him an indication of what was making him feel sick. Virgil was going to murder him._

_He stumbled up to the cockpit and sat down heavily in the pilots chair. John popped up on the dash._

_"Scott. What did I say?"_

_Scott just smiled innocently. "Sorry bro."_

_John growled in annoyance. "It's not funny Scott. You could have passed out and hit your head. And you are not flying home."_

_"John I'm fine." Scott tried to reassure. "It was just a dizzy spell."_

_"Scott, I am remote flying One home and Virgil is going to be waiting for you at the other end to take you to the infirmary because we are pretty sure you have heatstroke."_

_Yeah he was pretty sure on that as well so he just groaned and leaned his head back against the chair. He tried closing his eyes but the world spun around him every time he did so he focused on a spot on the roof and fought to keep the contents of his stomach as John flew him home._

"Ha! You're way more of a screw up than me." Gordon boasted as soon as Scott was finished. "I'm here because of an unavoidable _accident_ whereas you're here cause you're just an idiot."

Scott scoffed at the statement but Virgil just raised his eyes in amusement. At Scott's look of betrayal he stated. "What? He's not wrong."

"Virgil I was busy!"

"Not too busy to take care of yourself. All you've accomplished is John having to monitor your sun exposure and water intake from now on."

"John doesn't have time for that."

"Exactly! So, stop making it a necessity."

Scott huffed in frustration but Virgil just glared at him. He could see Gordon out of the corner of his eye itching to break the awkward silence but he gave his brother a slight shake of his head. He was not letting Scott get away with this one. He could understand one mistake but this was not the first time this had happened. Scott needed a reminder that they were not invincible, especially to the forces of nature.

He was pretty sure that in Scott's mind the only dangers were the stuff that could actually hit you. That's why Virgil had to be the one that watched out for the more subtle heath concerns of their job but he was tired of Scott not listening to him.

"Okay." Scott finally conceded. "I'm sorry, I was being stupid."

"Good." Virgil nodded, accepting the statement. He was pretty sure that was all he was going to get out of his stubborn eldest brother.

Scott flopped his arms over his eyes and Virgil winced, knowing Scott probably had a horrible headache at the moment.

"The ice in those packs has probably melted by now. I'll swap them out." Virgil reasoned heading to the door so he could replenish their supply of ice from the kitchen.

"Good idea, I feel like a furnace." Scott replied, arms still covering his face and mumbling his words slightly.

"That's it." Gordon suddenly declared. "I'm coming over to cuddle."

Scott deadpanned him. "We are not cuddling Gordon."

Gordon was already climbing out of his own bed though, keeping one of his blankets clutched tightly around him as he shivered. "Too late. Gimme some of that heat"

Virgil just laughed as he swiftly made his exit. It honestly wasn't the worst idea in the world. He could still hearing his brothers bickering as he walked down the hall though.

"Just so you know, I kick in my sleep."

"Gordon get off my bed!"


End file.
